UC Merced Connect: Campus recognized for green practices

For the first time, UC Merced made the Princeton Review’s list of the most environmentally responsible colleges.

The education-services company, known for its test prep and tutoring services, books, and college rankings, features UC Merced in the 2015 edition of its free book, the Princeton Review Guide to 353 Green Colleges.

Some of the key factors considered in the listing are whether students have a quality of life on campus that is both healthy and sustainable; how well schools prepare students for employment in an increasingly green economy; and how environmentally responsible a school’s policies are.

“With strong sustainability policies, campuswide sustainability efforts and having all of our buildings LEED certified by the U.S. Green Building Council, UC Merced deserves its place among the country’s greenest schools,” Assistant Vice Chancellor for Strategic Facilities Planning Graeme Mitchell said. “It’s quite an honor to have the Princeton Review recognize our work.”

The Princeton Review said there is growing interest in green colleges by college-bound students, and a survey conducted by the company notes that 61 percent of students said having information about a school’s commitment to the environment would influence their decision to apply to the college.

The Princeton Review’s profiles provide information about each school's admission requirements, cost and financial aid, and student body statistics, as well as green facts about each school, including transportation alternatives and the percentage of the school food budget spent on local and organic food.

Students earn science fellowships

UC Merced graduate students Theo Crouch II and Lauren Edwards have been awarded fellowships from the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program.

Jessica Ross received an honorable mention from the GRFP, while Patricia Cabral received an honorable mention from the National Academies of Science and Engineering’s Ford Predoctoral Fellowship Program. The news comes on the heels of cognitive science student David Vinson’s selection for an intensely competitive $30,000 IBM Ph.D. Fellowship Award.

The NSF GRFP honors and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering and mathematics disciplines who are pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees.

Crouch and Edwards, both members of Professor Fabian Filipp’s Systems Biology and Cancer Metabolism group, will each receive $34,000 per year for three years, while the university receives $12,000 in institutional support for each of the three years.

This year, there were 16,500 fellowship applicants. Two thousand fellowships were awarded; in addition, 2,004 honorable mentions were acknowledged.

Crouch is in the second year of his doctoral program. In one of his key projects, he is investigating alternative approaches to cell or tissue health and growth using biological experiments and computational techniques.

Edwards, a first-year student, is studying metabolic switches in humans to better understand how metabolism is controlled through a cell. If she can identify particular genes that have an effect on metabolism when they are turned on or off, she may be able to use that knowledge for a variety of applications, including the treatment of cancer patients.

While honorable mentions do not receive any funding from the foundations, the UC Merced Graduate Division has awarded both Ross and Cabral a Graduate Dean’s Fellowship in the amount of $5,000 in acknowledgment of their achievements.

Ross is a second-year student who works with Ramesh Balasubramaniam in the Cognitive and Information Sciences program. Cabral is a psychology student working with Professor Jan Wallander.

This story was originally published April 27, 2015 at 5:55 PM with the headline "UC Merced Connect: Campus recognized for green practices."